The prior art discloses several convergent mediation solutions that can meet the above challenges with varying degrees of success.
Convergent mediation solutions in the market are typically real-time collection based systems that are integrated with legacy pre-paid systems. These ‘convergent solutions’ are mainly a collection of different sets of known devices and systems. An example of such a system is described in FIG. 1.
Traditional off-line mediation, also called as billing mediation, solution contains functionalities like collection of usage data from network elements, aggregation, conversion of data format to unified format, correlation, etc. This all has been ready for years and most likely will be used for years to come.
On the other hand, online mediation solutions are used, for example for charging the non-voice services of prepaid customers, executing charging for a multimedia session between a mobile terminal and a remote host on both an application/media level and on an IP/access bearer level, and for minimizing credit losses caused by subscribers, while at the same time maintaining good performance of the system.
Also the traditional IN-based Prepaid Systems have been designed for charging the voice calls of prepaid customers. Already today prepaid subscribers form the majority of the total worldwide customer base and they want to be able to use the same services as the postpaid users. Until now, the lack of open, real-time charging solution has been slowing down the service deployment for prepaid subscribers.
In a preferred online mediation solution an end user session management, especially for charging, is required. In most of the prior art systems, operations requiring faster end user session charging cannot be performed, and operations desiring faster end user charging are performed inconveniently. An example of operations that require faster end user session charging is online service offered to an unknown subscriber. An example of an operation that is performed inconveniently is one where subscriber has to give one's credit card number to unreliable host for charging Internet purchases.
Patent application publication WO 2004/095326 discloses a real-time and continuous off-line mediation method for event records generated by telecommunications network.
Patent application publication WO 2005/027409 discloses an online charging method in communications network.
Patent application publication EP 1761021 A1 discloses one kind of convergent pre- and post-paid billing architecture. The principle idea of EP 1761021 is that pre- and post-paid billing systems are combined together with rating and customer management facilities.
Patent application publication WO 2007/020499 discloses an online charging management server used with account management system. These kinds of solutions are also determined by different standardisation organisations like 3GPP, ETSI, etc.
Patent application publication WO 2007/002577 discloses a converged off-line and converged online charging systems with a common rating and charging gateway function.